The present invention relates to an information recording and playing back system and method thereof, which provides a first recording and playing back apparatus such as a hard disk (HD) being a high speed apparatus that records audio sounds and video images (hereinafter referred to as AV information) of plural channels from tuners and can play back the recorded AV information of plural channels to external output terminals at the same time, and further provides a dubbing function that designated AV information is dubbed from the first recording and playing back apparatus to a second recording and playing back apparatus such as a digital video disk (DVD)-RAM being a low speed apparatus.
Recently, an information recording and playing back apparatus used a HD being a high speed apparatus as recording media has been developed against a video cassette recorder (VCR) of such as a VHS system using tapes as recording media. At this information recording and playing back apparatus, a transferring rate of recording media is very high, therefore a few to dozens of channels of the AV information of, for example, a moving picture experts group (MPEG) 2 of about 6 megabits per second can be recorded and played back at the same time. Therefore, in case that AV information is dubbed from the information recording and playing back apparatus used HD to another information recording and playing back apparatus, which is built-in at the same apparatus or an external apparatus, a recording and playing back apparatus being high convenient for users being fully different from conventional dubbing can be provided. In this, another information recording and playing back apparatus is used for storage like a library, therefore, this apparatus is a DVD-RAM or a conventional VCR being low transferring rate. However, at the dubbing by the conventional recording tape type VCR, the AV information is dubbed in one apparatus to one apparatus. Consequently, the high performance of this new information recording and playing back apparatus can not be fully utilized.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. HEI 9-121368 discloses a recording and playing back apparatus, in which NTSC or PAL system being broadcasting system is detected, and the system is automatically set at dubbing operation and the operation performance for users is improved.
And Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. HEI 7-312020 discloses a recording and playing back apparatus, in which a disk playing back section and a magnetic recording playing back section are provided in an apparatus, and one touch dubbing function, in which playing back signals of audio sounds and video images in the disk playing back section can be recorded at the magnetic recording playing back section by switching on one button, is provided.
Further, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. HEI 5-75962 discloses a audio and video signals recording and playing back apparatus. This apparatus can output signals except a recording signal even during recording, and can also output playing back signals and the other signals at the same time even during playing back, by controlling switches. That is, the other images can be watched even during recording or dubbing. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a conventional apparatus. As shown in FIG. 1, for example, when AV information from an external input terminal 12 is dubbed at a recording/playing back section 22 by connecting the external input terminal 12 and the recording/playing back section 22 by a switch 31, a user can watch a broadcasting program obtained from a tuner 21 by connecting an external output terminal 14 and the tuner 21 by switching on switches 32 and 33. However, at this time the recording/playing back section 22 is used only for dubbing.
As mentioned above, in conventional technologies including mentioned above three technologies regarding dubbing, at the AV information processing such as dubbing, an apparatus outputting AV data and an apparatus recording the data handle only one channel information, therefore both apparatuses for playing back and recording are occupied by transferring the AV information. Consequently, there is a problem that a multi channel simultaneous recording and playing back apparatus, which can record and play back the other AV information while AV information for dubbing is made to be playing back and outputting, can not fulfill its performance.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an information recording and playing back system and an method thereof, when designated AV information is dubbed from a first recording and playing back apparatus to a second recording and playing back apparatus, in which the second recording and playing back apparatus can perform dubbing while the first recording and playing back apparatus is continuing its normal recording and playing back state, without that a user does not consider a transferring rate that changes corresponding to a recording and playing back state of the first recording and playing back apparatus. In this, the first recording and playing back apparatus, such as a hard disk (HD) is a high speed apparatus that can record audio sounds and video images (AV information) of plural channels from tuners and can play back the recorded AV information of plural channels to external output terminals at the same time. And the second recording and playing back apparatus such as a DVD-RAM is a low speed apparatus.
According to the present invention, an information recording and playing back system, which provides a first recording and playing back apparatus that can records and play back audio and video (AV) information of plural channels at the same time and a second recording and playing back apparatus, which is built-in or set outside said system, can record and play back said AV information from said first recording and playing back apparatus, can perform dubbing of required AV information from said first recording and playing back apparatus to said second recording and playing back apparatus, comprises a first transferring rate detecting means for detecting a usable transferring rate of said first recording and playing back apparatus, a second transferring rate detecting means for detecting a usable transferring rate of said second recording and playing back apparatus, and a comparator that compares detected two transferring rates and outputs a slower transferring rate, and said dubbing of AV information is performed corresponding to said slower transferring rate.
In this constitution, the dubbing operation is performed corresponding to the slower transferring rate in the transferring rates of the first recording and playing back apparatus whose transferring rate changes in the normal recording and playing back operation and the second recording and playing back apparatus, that is, the dubbing operation is performed at a transferring rate as fast as possible. And even at the cases that a playing back request occurs during the dubbing and a recording reserved beforehand is started, the dubbing speed is automatically adjusted.
According to the present invention, an information recording and playing back system further comprises a user interface with which a user can select a high dubbing speed or a low dubbing speed, in case that the user selects the low dubbing speed, the system does not suspend the recording and playing back of said AV information for the first recording and playing back apparatus that is recording and playing back, and does not stop requests for recording and playing back after this, and in case that the user selects the high dubbing speed, the system suspends the playing back of said AV information for the first recording and playing back apparatus that is recording and playing back, and stops requests for playing back after this, and the dubbing of the AV information is performed corresponding to the slower transferring rate.
Consequently, when the user requires a high speed dubbing, the user can suspend the playing back operation of the first recording and playing back apparatus or stop a playing back request during the dubbing operation. Therefore, the high speed dubbing can be performed.
According to the present invention, an information recording and playing back system further comprises a remaining time displaying apparatus that calculates remaining time until the dubbing is finished by using the slower transferring rate obtained from said comparator being the actual dubbing speed and the remaining amount of the AV information to be dubbed, and informs the user the remaining time until the dubbing is finished.
Consequently, the user can recognize in real time the remaining dubbing time of the currently performing dubbing operation at the operating state of the first recording and playing back apparatus.